ABSTRACT
Since the Bush administration’s decision to withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in December 2001, the US has embarked on aggressive plans for ballistic-missile defence (BMD). The Japan Defense Agency plans to deploy one of its four Aegis destroyers equipped with SM-3 by the end of 2007 and expand this provision to the rest of the Aegis destroyers by 2011. China’s reactions to these moves have thus far been muted. On 15 December 2001, the day after the US decision to withdraw from the ABM Treaty, the Chinese Foreign Ministry responded by calling for multilateral talks on the issue. With China’s surprisingly measured response, a number of American and Japanese observers have begun to argue that Beijing’s past anti-BMD campaign was merely rhetorical. Most Chinese experts reject the notion that missile defence is a defensive system.
